A BJP leader has threatened to behead Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah if he eats beef. Alleging that the CM was "behaving like a dictator", SN Channabasappa, a former president of the erstwhile Shivamogga City Municipal Council, dared Siddaramaiah to eat beef at Gopi Circle in Shivamogga on Monday.

"He has stated he would eat beef if he chooses to do so and nobody could stop him," said the local leader during a protest organised by the BJP against the CM's remarks on beef. "If he does so, he will be beheaded. We won’t think twice about that."

Channabasappa claimed that the Congress leader has hurt Hindu sentiments with his remark last week, where he had said nobody could stop him from eating beef.

"Till date I have never eaten cow meat. But if it suits my palette and if I want to eat beef, I will eat it. Nobody can stop me," he said at a Karnataka Youth Congress General Body meeting. He later told journalists that he would stand by his statement, and that no one could stop him from eating "beef, pork or any other meat". This was in the backdrop of recent protests against consuming beef and an alleged Delhi Police raid at the Kerala government's state house canteen in New Delhi over sale of "beef fry". "Nobody can stop me and I don't get bogged by BJP protest," he said.

Meanwhile M Shankar, spokesperson for the BJP’s Shivamogga district unit, likened Siddaramaiah to a meat shop owner. “If he eats beef, then Congress workers will eat dog, fox and so on to appease him and get the posts of chairmen of boards and corporations,” Deccan Herald quoted him saying.

The state BJP has shrugged responsibility for the incident, and BJP state spokesperson S Prakash apparently told The News Minute: “Why don’t you ask him? If a (leader) in a district has said something, what can we do?”